Missouri's last abortion clinic says it may lose its license this week St. Louis, Missouri — The last remaining abortion clinic in Missouri says it expects to be shut down this week, effectively ending legal abortion in the state. Planned Parenthood said it plans to sue the state "in order to try to keep serving Missouri women." "This is not a drill. This is not a warning. This is a real public health crisis," said Dr. Leana Wen, president and CEO of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America. Planned Parenthood president Dr. Leana Wen.CBS NEWS A call and email to the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services were not immediately returned. Representatives for Planned Parenthood told CBS News that the upcoming deadline follows weeks of back-and-forth with state health officials. On May 20, the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services notified Planned Parenthood of three issues that could impact license renewal, according to documents reviewed by CBS News and provided by Planned Parenthood. On May 22, Planned Parenthood said it would address two of them: adjusting who at the clinic provided the state-mandated counseling and adding an additional pelvic exam for abortion patients. But it said a third request was out of its control. According to Planned Parenthood, the health department said it was investigating "deficient practices," and needed to interview seven physicians who provide care at the clinic. Planned Parenthood said it could offer interviews only with two who are its employees. The remaining physicians provide services at the facility but aren't employed by Planned Parenthood and have not agreed to be interviewed. In its letter, the Department of Health wrote that it could not "complete our investigation until it interviews the physicians involved in the care provided in the potential deficient practices," and that "the investigation needs to be completed and any deficiencies resolved before the expiration of [the clinic's] license on May 31, 2019." Dr. Colleen McNicholas, a Planned Parenthood physician in St. Louis, said the agency hasn't shared details of the investigation or the potential concerns. She expected to be interviewed by the health agency Tuesday afternoon, an apparent compromise from the state, which had initially requested that interviews be conducted in a specific order with other physicians going first. "We are 100 percent committed to the best care that we can provide for patients. So certainly if there is an issue with the care we're providing we want to know about it," she said. "We want to be able to address that. But we can't do that when we're being attacked." In a statement to be released later Tuesday, Planned Parenthood said Missouri's health department is "refusing to renew" its annual license to provide abortion in the state. If the license is not renewed by May 31, Missouri would become the first state without a functioning abortion clinic since 1973 when Roe v. Wade was decided. Planned Parenthood would still be able to provide non-abortion health services for women in Missouri. In 2019, six states — including Missouri — have passed laws banning virtually all abortions. In each case, the laws have not yet been enacted and face court challenges. But now it appears Missouri would be losing its last clinic as a result of state regulations, not a new law. Clinics that can't comply with the regulations may be forced to shut their doors, something that happened to several clinics in Missouri when the state began requiring pelvic exams for medical abortions, a method administered by pill, according to McNicholas. Although Planned Parenthood, in this year's negotiations with the state, agreed to administer an extra pelvic exam for surgical abortions, the group wouldn't budge on pill-administered ones. "When I say an unnecessary pelvic exam what I mean is that the state is forcing me to put my fingers in somebody's vagina when it is totally medically irrelevant," McNicholas said. "That is really bordering on harassment... I am really proud of our clinicians for taking a stand and saying you know we just won't do that to patients." In 2008, Missouri had 5 abortion clinics. "This a chilling warning for all of us that we are in a public health crisis," said Dr. Wen in an email to CBS News. "Today it's Missouri, tomorrow it could be all of America." https://www.cbsnews.com/news/planne...e-its-license-this-week-exclusive-2019-05-28/
Well thank God we don't do Tornado's or even really Hurricanes in Ireland; which is very,very fortunate as we don't really do basements either. Every time I think or something like this I think of the' 'Wizard of Oz' and the words, 'Toto this isn't Kansas anymore!' I am afraid with the internet I tend to get a little desensitized to suffering and look on it all like some sci fi movie. One thing recently has stirred me and that is a priest in Nigeria reporting the massacres by Islamists there. Poor People. Well it all teaches me to count my blessings. Prayers.
We still need more conservatives on SCOTUS bench...or is it going to be a little by little approach. Once again Justice Thomas comes through to teach some important facts to the rest. Only correction would be that birth control (at least certain specific forms of the pill) doesn't reduce all conceptions....but only makes the womb inhospitable to implantation and thus causes an "abortion".: SUPREME COURT STRIKES COMPROMISE TO DODGE ABORTION DISPUTE The Supreme Court reinstated a provision of Indiana law Monday requiring abortion clinics to cremate or bury fetal remains. In an apparent compromise, however, the justices declined to review a second provision of the Indiana law that banned abortions on the basis of sex, race, or disability. The 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said both provisions were unconstitutional. The 7th Circuit said Indiana had not identified a rational basis for its fetal disposal regulations, since fetuses do not qualify as human beings and thus cannot be regulated like persons under law. The Supreme Court summarily reversed that finding, a rarely-used mechanism saved for decisions that are clearly wrong. “This Court has already acknowledged that a state has a ‘legitimate interest in proper disposal of fetal remains,'” the high court’s unsigned opinion reads. “The 7th Circuit clearly erred in failing to recognize that interest as a permissible basis for Indiana’s disposition law.” The decision was narrow and left the Court’s “undue burden” test undisturbed, further solidifying the perception of a compromise. In the 1992 Planned Parenthood v. Casey ruling, the justices said that the validity of abortion regulations would turn on whether they imposed an “undue burden” on abortion access. In Monday’s case, Planned Parenthood did not argue that Indiana’s fetal disposal rules impose an undue burden. Rather, Planned Parenthood challenged the provision under a different test. “This case, as litigated, therefore does not implicate our cases applying the undue burden test to abortion regulations,” the opinion reads. Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor dissented from the Court’s decision to restore the disposal rules, but agreed that denying review of the trait-selective abortion ban was correct. (RELATED: Forget Alabama. These Abortion Cases Are In Front Of The Supreme Court Right Now) Justice Thomas rails against eugenics In a separate concurring opinion, Justice Clarence Thomas said the Court would eventually have to decide whether trait-selective abortions are constitutional, calling such procedures “modern day eugenics.” “Given the potential for abortion to become a tool of eugenic manipulation, the Court will soon need to confront the constitutionality of laws like Indiana’s,” Thomas wrote. “But because further percolation may assist our review of this issue of first impression, I join the Court in declining to take up the issue now.” Thomas’s concurrence canvassed the early history of the American birth control movement, saying that campaign was intertwined with eugenic efforts to reduce the population of racial minorities and disabled people. The arguments behind eugenic birth control, Thomas said, apply with even greater force to abortion. “The individualized nature of abortion gives it even more eugenic potential than birth control, which simply reduces the chance of conceiving any child,” Thomas wrote. “Abortion has proved to be a disturbingly effective tool for implementing the discriminatory preferences that undergird eugenics,” he added. In that connection, Thomas noted that the abortion rate for fetuses diagnosed with down syndrome in utero is over 90 percent in some European countries, while sex-selective abortion of girls across Asia have produced disproportionately male populations. This is breaking news. This post will be updated. https://dailycaller.com/2019/05/28/supreme-court-abortion-indiana/
Powerful Padraig. Powerful image. We must must stay in the barquevof Peter hidden within the Immaculate Heart our only safe refuge.
Yes I'm afraid things are about to take a very, very bad turn for the worst. In fact I believe they already have. It wouldn't be so bad if we had the Vatican to watch our backs. But we don't. The only way they'll be watching our backs from Rome is to stick something in it. Ask poor Cardinal Zen and our poor Chinese brothers and sisters in the Faith.
Just so sad. It has been one weather catastrophe after another in the Midwest. I cannot even imagine what it must be like to pick up the pieces of your life in the aftermath of such destruction. I have noticed many vehicles with out of state license plates in our area. I think many are relocating here from hard hit areas of the country.
This is not good for farming and commerce, either. There are many ways these chastisements hurt us, as EtoA posted.
True. These disasters have far reaching effects. Not to mention you just never know when the storm of the century will descend upon your neck of the woods. I try not to think about hurricane season.
THE CHURCH’S PRAYERS AGAINST CALAMITIES https://www.churchmilitant.com/news/article/the-churchs-prayers-against-calamities
I'm not quite sure if there's a correlation of more and stronger tornadoe's in the USA in fact it seemed loads worse of all in the early 1970's: https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/climate-information/extreme-events/us-tornado-climatology/trends
Although it is very true that Natural Disasters in general have been getting a lot worse: https://publicintegrity.org/environment/climate-change-natural-disasters/
The increasing public effects of natural disasters might have behavioural causes. Increases in population, building on floodplains and areas prone to earthquake and volcanic eruption will inevitably lead to greater human suffering. It is likely that Divine Justice will include the suffering of consequences for imprudent behaviour and planning.
Illinois Lawmakers Move Forward With Nation’s Most Liberal Abortion Legislation While some states are seeking to limit abortion — especially after a fetal heartbeat can be detected — Illinois lawmakers are moving forward with a bill to allow abortion right up until the day the baby is due to be delivered. In a late-night vote Sunday, An Illinois House committee approved the Reproductive Health Act (RHA) in a straight party-line vote. The bill would remove all abortion restrictions in Illinois, repealing both the state’s Partial Birth Abortion Ban Act and the Illinois Abortion Act of 1975. Under the bill, all restrictions on abortions later in pregnancy would be removed, as would any criminal penalties for doctors who perform them. In addition, the bill would mandate that insurance companies need to cover the cost of abortions. “RHA codifies our existing practices and, and this is critical, treats abortion care just like any other health care, because it is,” said state representative and bill author Kelly Cassidy (D-Chicago), according to ABC-7 in Chicago. “Make no mistake, it doesn’t end here. Since Roe was decided in 1973, our opponents have fought to impede access to care and these efforts have the greatest impact on the most vulnerable population,” Cassidy said. Cassidy sponsored a bill that if passed would be the most liberal reproductive health care measure in the country. But opponents say the bill was rushed, leaving them little time for debate. “This is new language. It strips completely any rights of state to protect the rights of the unborn,” said Zach Wichmann, director of government relations for the Catholic Conference of Illinois. Religious organizations, including Catholic churches have already begun to mobilize their base, asking congregants to reach out to lawmakers. “We need to pray for them so they will be filled with the Holy Spirit so they can make the right decision,” said Holy Name parishioner Liji George. The bill says “Every individual who becomes pregnant has a fundamental right to continue the pregnancy and give birth or to have an abortion, and to make autonomous decisions about how to exercise that right. A fertilized egg, embryo, or fetus does not have independent rights under the laws of this State.” The measure follows legislation in other states to tighten abortion laws. Alabama has approved a new law that makes it a felony for a doctor to perform an abortion in most cases and Georgia passed the “heartbeat bill” that prohibits bans abortion after doctors detect a heartbeat in a fetus. In the latter law, doctors would face criminal prosecution. https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/20...th-nations-most-liberal-abortion-legislation/
Padraig, since you've never experienced the thrill of hearing a tornado siren go off in your back yard, I'm here to remedy that! All of these videos are of the Wichita/Andover tornado of 1991. The tornado started on the western side of the city of Wichita (Kansas), moved around through the southern part and hit McConnell Air Force Base, and then continued its swing through the eastern part and onto the suburb of Andover. Andover was for all intents and purposes wiped out. In the first video from McConnell, you can see the tornado grow. At the beginning it's around EF1 (Extended Fujita scale) to EF2, and the vortex at ground level is between a meter and 2 meters across. By the 2 minute mark on the video it's grown to be at least 6 meters across and within another minute it's at least 10 meters across. By the time it reached Andover it was estimated to be almost half a kilometer (1/4 mile) wide. This second video is also from McConnell. Half of it shows the tornado approaching and moving through the air base. (What's missing is where the tornado turns pink -- it had destroyed a greenhouse and sucked up all the flower petals.) The second half shows the destruction on the base itself and the people disbelieving what they're seeing: This last one is still considered one of the best tornado videos made, where you can clearly see the debris rotating inside the vortex: I'll admit: I chose this tornado because after it finished in Andover the storm system moved up the highway to Topeka (Kansas) where my wife and I lived, and we spent several hours in our basement. After everything had calmed down, I looked out the window to see these white things floating down. They were bank statements and business papers from the Wichita area that had been carried by the wind about 700Km (about 460 miles) from Wichita to Topeka. Enjoy.
Well, well.. French Senate Says Notre Dame Cathedral Must Be Restored Exactly As it Was Before Fire — No Islamic Minarets or Swimming Pools Following the disastrous fire on April 15th, modern architects made plans for the new and updated Notre Dame Catholic Cathedral in Paris, France. Proposed plans included a giant glass spire to signify secularism or an Islamic minaret to respect the growing Muslim population. This came after President Emmanuel Macron’s prime minister announced there would be a competition in design to rebuild the infamous cathedral. On Monday the French Senate approved the government’s Notre-Dame restoration bill – but added a clause that it must be restored to the state it was before the blaze. The Local reported: French Senators have stipulated that Notre-Dame cathedral must be restored exactly how it was before the devastating fire that tore through the Paris landmark. On Monday evening, the French Senate approved the government’s Notre-Dame restoration bill – but added a clause that it must be restored to the state it was before the blaze, striking a blow to the government which had launched an international architecture competition to debate ideas on the restoration. The subject of the rebuilding of the cathedral – which was left badly damaged after fire tore through the roof and destroyed the spire on April 15 – has become a fraught battleground between traditionalists who want an exact restoration and others who favour a more imaginative take. https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/20...e-fire-no-islamic-minarets-or-swimming-pools/
And then their is the silent natural disasters of rain and more rain. Farmers in the Midwest are very nervous. Many farmers cannot get their seed in the ground because of tremendous rain fall several days a week. Many who got their corn or beans in are aware that without dry weather soon, their crops will mold in the wet soil. 3" or more rain on any given day and the forecast is not showing an let up. Cooler temps and rain are not a good recipe for farmers silent tribulations.
